A view of the former auto repair shop at the 14th and Lavaca corner prior to demolition last year. Image: HHM & Associates
A plan for a 32-story downtown Austin condo tower containing 220 new residences at the southwest corner of 14th and Lavaca Streets is now in review with the city, according to recent permit filings — one of several condo projects sought by local developers Pearlstone Partners throughout downtown in recent years, and one of only a few residential towers planned specifically in the recently-booming northwest corner of downtown Austin since the 1960s. No, really!
After Austin’s City Council passed a (very good and cool) resolution last year allowing new buildings inside this area’s Capitol Dominance Overlay District to seek extra height through the city’s Downtown Density Bonus Program, the prospective 14th and Lavaca tower can rise to 32 floors instead of being capped at around 13 due to the old height restrictions of the overlay — this extra density adds an estimated $1 million additional payment from the developers into the city’s affordable housing fund.
The roughly 0.4-acre tower site was cleared of its previous structures last summer after city approval of a demolition permit, meaning we could see a groundbreaking here almost any ol’ time in the coming year. While design details beyond the tower’s unit count are unclear for the moment, we think it’s a good bet that Pearlstone’s frequent collaborators at local architecture firm STG Design are behind the wheel, especially considering they cooked up the development study that demonstrated how much more the city could get out of the site if it were allowed to seek a density bonus:
This development study shows a hypothetical tower that could be built at the 14th and Lavaca site if allowed to participate in the DDBP without the limits of the Capitol Dominance Overlay. While we don’t know many details of the tower actually proposed here now, it seems to line up fairly closely with the design from this study. Image: Pearlstone Partners / ATCO Properties / STG Design
A view of the 14th and Lavaca corner during its demolition last summer. Photo by James Rambin
The only bummer of the project so far appears to be its eight-story parking podium, which stings a bit more than usual considering the future presence of Project Connect’s Orange Line a block away on Guadalupe Street, not to mention one of its underground rail stations, “Government Center,” planned only three blocks away.
Problem is, buildings like 14th and Lavaca secure financing based on the transportation conditions (and thus the parking needs) expected at the time of completion. While this particular tower will probably be rounding the corner by 2025 or thereabouts, speaking optimistically the Orange Line rolls out in the 2030s — meaning our city’s extended heel-dragging on transit has created a lot of car-oriented buildings that won’t be easy to retrofit once the train finally comes to town. Anyway, 32 floors sure is a heck of a lot better than 13, and that’s a good start.
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